George Santos, Adam Schiff, Hidden Docs, Banning Books
No, this isn’t a new line for “We Didn’t Start the Fire” by Billy Joel.
It is a list of disparate events in the last week that show just how far Republicans in the US Congress and in the states they control are willing to go to impose their will on the American people.
Political scientists call this fascism, but that word has lost all meaning. So we must find another word—perhaps Tyranny? Anti-American? Big Brother Dictatorship. Let’s workshop it. Whatever we call it, these anti-freedom Republicans’ sole goal is control. They don’t care about good governance, truth, integrity, or real leadership. They want to control what we see, what we read, how we express ourselves, even how we dress.
A quick summary for people who haven’t been paying close attention. This list is far from comprehensive.
New lies that George Santos (or whatever his name is) has told emerge daily, including the fact that he did not lend his campaign money…somebody else did. Not only does that break campaign finance laws, but we don’t really know who owns Santos. And Kevin McCarthy and House Rs don’t care.
Kevin McCarthy has kicked Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell off the Intelligence committee. Why? Because they took part in Trump’s impeachment. Yet McCarthy took part in the sedition that almost overthrew American Democracy.
The former head of FBI Counterintelligence Charles McGonigal who found “no evidence of Russian Interference” before 2016 election has been arrested for money laundering and aiding Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska.
Rs are on the attack for Biden finding and turning in docs with classified markings, and Mike Pence found some classified docs at his house. Neither of this is the same as Trump hiding docs from the government and potentially selling the information within.
Florida, Indiana, and a good many other states are introducing and passing bills that ban hundreds of books from school libraries and shutter teachers’ classroom libraries. This is a classic dictatorship tactic to keep kids poorly educated and incapable of critical thinking.
I could go on and on and on. But I won’t. Because what I want to talk about most is what we do about this and what we say about this. And what we don’t focus on. The goal here is to win elections and build power. Period.
DO: Keep donating to and volunteering for organizations that are building political power. If you’re affiliated with one of those organizations, keep your eye on the ball and the the voters. We can’t be distracted by every single outrage. Republicans want us to dilute our focus and chase every single shiny object, not buckle down and build our strength to win elections.
DO: Focus you conversations with friends and on social media on how Democrats are making peoples’ everyday lives better. Inflation is coming down. Roads and bridges are being built or repaired. States and cities are receiving money to build infrastructure and help families, and Democrats are responsible.
DO: Focus your conversation on how Republicans aren’t a normal political party. They’re dedicated to control, preventing freedom, introducing culture wars all because they want to control what people do, say, and learn. It’s important that people understand the stakes. The Republican party is not a good faith party any longer. Media coverage of politics as usual is what they want, and we need to show why that’s wrong.
DO: Discuss how Dems are protecting Americans’ Freedoms: Reproductive Freedom, Freedom to learn the real history of America, Freedom to dress how they’d like, Freedom to determine their own sense of self and how they want the world to see them.
DON’T: Get dragged into process conversations, like how Kevin McCarthy chooses intelligence committee members.
DON’T: Focus on Republican hypocrisy. That’s an insider conversation and it means we’re not talking about who is actually protecting Americans’ freedom.
How do we build political power?
Everywhere Dems won in the midterms, Arizona, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Georgia, Dem organizations have been building power for years. We need to keep up the pressure in those states, and then we need to start building power in states we think are lost. Like Indiana, Missouri, Ohio.
As you know, we are trying to build power in Indiana. It may seem hopeless at the moment, but we’ve got to start at the beginning and over time we’ll be able to turn the tide, because Hoosiers aren’t nearly as extreme as their unaccountable representatives.
We’ve got a plan, and we’ll be rolling out invitations to help organize in the next couple of weeks. In the meantime, here’s my ask of you. If you’re in a truly Blue state, or in a state that has already shored up democratic power, please adopt Indiana or another Red state where hard working activists are trying to build power to stymie the Chaos Caucus, Tyrannical Right, Dicatatorship Defenders.
Stuff to Consume:
Look for our upcoming podcast What the Gerrymander? with Heidi Beidinger. I’ll let you know when it’s available for subscriptions (very, very soon!)
Read Popular Information by Judd Legum. He’s recently reported on Republican bans on books in schools. This is happening in Indiana too.
Indiana Insights:
Listen to Session Sessions, a weekly podcast with Blake Johnson about Indiana Statehouse activity.
Thank you for reading this and thinking about how we can build political power for democracy in Indiana! Please consider an ongoing small donation at www.hoosiervictoryalliance.org.